The first published catalogue of
Kircher's museum, the frontispiece of which can be seen here, advertised it as a
"theatre of nature and art". Here Kircher displayed perpetual-motion machines,
optical tricks, a mermaid's tail, the bones of a giant and a host of other natural and
artificial marvels to learned visitors to the Jesuit college in Rome. In the frontispiece
are the five wooden obelisks, some of which still survive, constructed by Kircher and his
assistants in imitation of the Egyptian obelisks scattered around Rome.